GRENKE Classic 5: Magnus wins but Levon leads

Magnus Carlsen has finally won a game in the 2017 GRENKE
Chess Classic, taking full advantage of a blunder as early as move 5 by Georg
Meier. That put Magnus back in the hunt for 1st place, but his chances suffered
a blow when Levon Aronian managed to convert a tricky ending against Arkadij
Naiditsch. Fabiano Caruana is a point back with Magnus after trading blows with
Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in the Najdorf, as is Hou Yifan, who could blow the
tournament wide open if she managed to beat Aronian in their Round 6 game.

With only three rounds remaining it was now or never on
Thursday for Magnus, and he took his chance. You can play through all the games
with computer analysis by clicking on a result below:

The organisers continue to produce excellent videos giving an impression of each day's action:

And for a recap of the round you can't do better than our commentator Peter Leko:

You can of course also rewatch the full commentary with
Peter and Jan Gustafsson:

Highlights of that 5-hour show include Leko comparing
super-grandmasters in the playing hall to Jean-Claude Van Damme training
blindfold in the movie Bloodsport… and his discussion of someone he’s often
compared to:

Leko: Anish Giri I
think is extremely good in openings. He’s also very flexible, he plays all
kinds of stuff. I have to say I’m not happy at all that he’s called a drawish
player, because for me as a top player it’s very interesting to follow Anish’s
games. He always comes up with interesting ideas, so I’m really looking forward
to every Anish game. People might joke about this that of course it’s because
Anish has kind of taken over my place in elite tournaments by producing ideas
but drawing many games. I really hope that Anish will come through this
difficult period because I know that when suddenly people only start to talk
about this, that Leko is only drawing, like now Anish is only drawing, this
really affects you. You really feel like you have to prove to the whole world
that no, you are fighting, you want to do this, that. In fact I think that
Anish has switched with Black almost exclusively to the Najdorf the last year
and that’s when all these so-called drawish streaks have happened. It has
nothing to do with his ambitions. He’s ambitious, he wants to play good chess,
but somehow maybe his converting the good positions is what he really has to
master and another thing is once you have many draws you always have extra
pressure when you have a better position, because you really feel like now you
have to win because if you fail to win everyone will start making jokes about
you again, so really there’s extra pressure. I feel for Anish in this sense,
because I know exactly how difficult it is to handle this situation.

Gustafsson: I’ve
talked a lot about this. I’m a big Anish fan and I believe nowadays it’s even
worse than maybe during your time, because social media is so much more
powerful. I’m sure that already now there’s a hundred Twitter jokes about Leko
and Giri: Leko says Giri is my boy. And even though I believe Anish is tough
mentally and he says he’s not affected you can’t help but realise these things
and then you feel you have to prove it to the world and it slightly changes how
he plays and I feel maybe that’s a reason why, of course he’s still up there,
but he’s lost a bit of rating, he’s fallen from 2800 to 2770.

Leko: I’m pretty
sure that he will come back. This is just temporary. I perfectly agree with
you, because he had a very good Candidates Tournament in 2016 in Moscow. I
think just by judging the quality of his games it looked like he was maybe
playing some of the best chess there. However, it ended up with 14 draws, with
a lot of jokes, and then in the next Stavanger tournament he started playing the
Bg5 Najdorf with White, Najdorfs with Black and everything. He really wanted to
prove to the world that yes, I’m going after blood.

Jan: It didn’t go
well – he scored minus 1 or minus 2.

Leko: Exactly. I
felt like he just really wanted to prove something to the world. I think when
he finally calms down and will play chess again for himself then the results
will come automatically as well.

Jan: He also just
had a kid, so he probably didn’t get as much sleep and as much Najdorf time as
usual. He will be back, but I’m sure he’s thrilled to hear our support! (laughs)

Our commentators then went on to discuss other opening
specialists such as Vladimir Kramnik, who’s undergone a transformation of late,
and many more subjects under the sun. If you’d like to support more shows with
the likes of Leko here on chess24 please consider going Premium for only $9.99 a
month – who knows, we may even be able to pay Peter enough for him to buy
his first mobile phone!

But now let’s switch to the Round 5 games:

The day after the night before

Arkadij Naiditsch and Georg Meier played out a bruising
6-hour draw in Round 4, and from what happened in Round 5 you might conclude
that neither had entirely recovered from it. On the other hand, it’s easy to be
made to look bad by the likes of Magnus Carlsen and Levon Aronian.

Meier knew it was going to tough, but he didn't need to make it so tough so soon... | photo: Georgios Souleidis, official website

Magnus knew that despite having the black pieces his game
against Georg Meier was a must-win if he wanted to have a real chance of
retaining the GRENKE Chess Classic title he won in the last edition in 2015. He
picked up the gauntlet by playing the Grünfeld Defence and reaped a reward as
early as move 5, when Meier opted for 5.g3?!

Georg struggled to explain his choice:

It’s kind of a shame to admit that over the board I just
decided to play g3, though I should know that it’s bad, and then when I
realised how bad it is I tried to do at least something interesting, but it
just doesn’t work at all.

Magnus said he didn’t know much, but he knew enough:

Usually in these positions Black takes on c4… it’s always
good for Black. I didn’t expect it to be quite this good.

Carlsen said the position was just lost after he cemented
his advantage with 17…c5 (“I don’t see how to avoid losing at least a pawn with
a bad position”), while Meier revealed that it came as a “cold shower” to him
when he realised his intended 16.Na4? Rxb7 17.Qxc4 ran into 17…Rb4!, when
taking the rook is of course met by 18…Nc2+, forking the king and queen.

Georg didn’t finally resign until move 41, but Magnus didn’t
put a foot wrong in converting his advantage. The glasses had scored their
first win:

Carlsen gave a separate interview afterwards:

Leko commented, “Usually when he starts scoring he’s
difficult to stop”, but even two wins in the remaining games might not be
enough, since Levon Aronian is flying on +3.

Playing his first supertournament since the last GRENKE Chess Classic two years ago, Naiditsch can hardly look | photo: Georgios Souleidis, official website

The story with Arkadij Naiditsch was similar. He was tricked
by a move-order surprise from Levon in the Catalan, and then led astray by his
usual principled approach. He went for an ambitious setup with 7…Nd5 and 8…b5,
but Aronian felt the next move was almost the fatal mistake:

9…Bb7?! was the most natural move in the world after pushing
the b-pawn, but instead 9…Nb4 was the recommendation of the players and
commentators. In the game Levon was able to burst through in the centre immediately with
10.Nxd5 Bxd5 11.e4 Bb7 12.d4 and although Arkadij called his 12…cxd4 “a horrible
move”, it’s not clear there was anything better, even if it may not have been the “only move” Levon called it.

Levon has a full point lead with two rounds to go, and must be targeting a first GRENKE Chess Classic title | photo: Georgios Souleidis, official website

Aronian soon had what looked like an overwhelming position,
but Naiditsch managed to avoid any immediate disaster and was instead simply on
the wrong side of some beautiful chess. Leko felt 29.b4! from Aronian was the
kind of aesthetic, dominating move you rarely get the chance to play on the
board in modern chess:

Nevertheless, what it came down to in the end was an
opposite-coloured bishop ending where Levon had a single extra pawn. Magnus
Carlsen’s gut feeling was that Naiditsch should hold, and he gave a fortress
line he felt would achieve that. He may have been right, but in the game there
was no fortress. 45…Kd5 looked to be a step in the wrong direction:

After 46.Be4+! Kc4 47.Bc6 Black's queenside pawns were going nowhere and it seems the white pawn phalanx could no longer be stopped. Levon was able
to blitz out his remaining moves before Naiditsch resigned on move 58.

Najdorf slugfest

There was a strong rumour that sharp lines of the Sicilian
had been made all but unplayable by computing advances, but in the last year we’ve
seen some spectacular theoretical battles at the very highest level of chess.
In Round 5 of the GRENKE Chess Classic Fabiano Caruana played the 6.Bg5
Najdorf, with Maxime deviating with 13…Bb7 from 13…g5, that had seen Hikaru
Nakamura go down in flames against Fabiano in the 2016 London Chess Classic. If
Fabiano had then played 14.Bg2 it would have been following Hikaru’s win
against Maxime from that same event. Instead he played a novelty, or at least a
move he said had only been seen before in correspondence games: 14.h2-h4!?

When Jan Gustafsson introduced the players afterwards he
said the game had ended peacefully, drawing the response from Maxime, “there
was nothing peaceful about this game!” The players continued with typical play
on opposite sides of the board until Caruana’s 19.f5:

Maxime, who is currently the world’s leading Najdorf expert,
felt this was “definitely not the way to go”, but while it’s true that Black at
least equalised after 19…Nxe5 20.fxe6 0-0 21.Qg1 Fabiano said he remembered
19.f5 was the correct move – it’s possible 21.g5! was the improvement in his
forgotten notes.

The game entered murky waters, with Black stabilising and,
as our commentators pointed out, that often means Black is better in the
Najdorf. That seemed to be the case, but after queens were exchanged it was
only Caruana who could then play for a win. Maxime commented:

I was quite ready to admit I was not better, but not to
admit that I must force a draw!

The game of course deserves more analysis than it could
possibly be given in a quick overview, but the result in any case was a draw on
move 43.

A very early surprise from Hou Yifan, since she usually plays 1.e4 | photo: Georgios Souleidis, official website

The other game to end in a draw was Hou Yifan vs. Bluebaum.
Both players were coming off a loss, or in fact in Bluebaum’s case three losses
in a row, so you might consider it a game both would be happy to draw. On the
other hand, who are you going to push for a win against in a supertournament
like this if not the players at roughly your own rating level? That uncertainty
as to goals perhaps manifested itself in the play.

Bluebaum was surprised by Hou Yifan’s 1.d4 but adopted a plan
Leko had introduced in the Ragozin last year and achieved a good position. Just
when Hou Yifan seemed to have a chance to castle and solve all her problems,
though, she came up with the aggressive 20…h4!?:

She would later describe it as:

A little bit too aggressive. Not the best move, but in a practical
game I decided to try something more interesting.

There were moments (e.g. with 24…g4!) when Matthias might
have got something more, though then in a time scramble Hou Yifan might have
had chances herself (the alternative 39.Rxf6 instead of 39.Nxf6 looks interesting). The draw reached on
move 48 was ultimately a fair outcome, meaning Matthias had drawn the overall
and women’s no. 1 in the event, while Hou Yifan is still in the group on second
place.

She was interviewed afterwards:

The full standings with two rounds to go are as follows:

Aronian now has White against Hou Yifan and could take a
huge step towards winning the tournament if he won. On the other hand, even if
he does win if Caruana can beat Bluebaum with Black that would still mean
Caruana would have the chance to beat Aronian in the final round (he has White)
and force a playoff. Of course if Hou Yifan beat Aronian that would truly set
the cat among the pigeons!

There’s also the Carlsen factor. He
has Black against Naiditsch in Round 6, and despite suffering a couple of big losses to Arkadij in the past the World Champion will no doubt be happy to have an opponent unlikely
to play for a draw. In the final round Magnus is White against MVL.